4 Men Charged After 2-state Probe Into Sexual Assaults On Children

November 13, 1991|By Sean Somerville of The Sentinel Staff

DAYTONA BEACH — Two Holly Hill men and two South Carolina men have been charged with sexually assaulting children.

Those arrested included Emmett Rozier, 51, a former television and radio reporter, who was charged Saturday with lewd and lascivious assault on a child after an investigation by Florida and South Carolina authorities.

A news release from State Attorney John Tanner's office did not give details of the case. But it said the charges involved sexual battery and lewd acts on boys who are under 12 and 14 years old.

Tanner also said that Daytona Beach attracts runaways and others who are vulnerable to sexual assault. ''Many times the young victims of this type of sexual abuse become the subject of child pornography films that are sold on the black market,'' he said.

Rozier, of 1091 Maple Ave., Holly Hill, was arrested on the same charge last year in a U.S. Customs undercover sting that netted more than three dozen boxes of child pornography and cracked an international child pornography operation.

Charges against Rozier in that case were dropped. Two other men were also charged in the July 1990 sting.

In 1982, Rozier pleaded no contest to a charge he let two boys watch a pornographic movie at his home.

Also arrested Saturday after an investigation by Tanner, the Daytona Beach Police Department and the South Carolina State Law Enforcement Division were:

- Jimmy Walker, 22, also of 1091 Maple Ave. He was charged with sexual battery.

- James Anasti, 46, of Columbia, S.C. Anasti was charged with being a principle to lewd and lascivious assault upon a child under 16 and sexual performance by a child.

- Warren Thompson, 21, of Columbia, S.C. He was charged with sexual battery.

Bail was set for Rozier and Walker at $50,000. Rozier posted bond Saturday. Walker was still being held Tuesday evening.

Thompson and Anasti will be extradited to Florida from South Carolina. Bail was set at $75,000 for Anasti and $50,000 for Thompson.